The Many Woods of Grief: Poems

Rock Creek, Pre-Dawn

71 ROCK CREEK, PRE-DAWN Natural history is the gentleness with which she placed her arms through her shirt-sleeves.The faces on the refrigerator newly dusted, the lettuce wilted, wet timberline and brow. Mistrusted fluids of the plastic sack. In this present, I fight it precisely, twist and tear filled pockets. I am, unlike my predecessor, entirely anxious when I awake to twilight, an afternoon nap, feet beyond the edge of the sheet. Autumn is upon me once again, and I sweep the walls of nymphal skins, of stonefly youths, small recognitions. It was the gentleness with which she teethed, broke free. Naturally, historically, my dreams of late issue domestic truths that gnaw my wrists to transformative raw. I can awake to these soft hours of truce no more. Misgivings and bruises. I conjure the sound of the creek though I must undress in the silence of recurring light. ...